Maisie

Maisie came to live with us when she was just 8 weeks old.  She was the last born of 10 and I remember going to see them all just after they were born. At that age of course, all puppies look the same, little balls of cuddly fluff. I went to see them a couple of times and by the time she was 6 weeks old, some of the pups were already promised to homes. We had decided we wanted a female so that narrowed down our choice. I  had to go and choose myself as Tony was away at sea. I took loads of photos to show him but that was largely unsuccessful because as well as being cuddly and fluffy, puppies are also running round. All I could show Tony was a lot of blurry images. They don't tend to sit still long enough to have their photo taken.  The joy of scooping her up and taking her home was huge.

Maisie at 8 weeks old

Once she was home with us she quickly became part of our family and we have enjoyed 11 years together, travelling all over the place and doing such fun things as sailing, canoeing and cycling. 

Tony fitted a special basket to the back of his bike so she could sit in it on the main roads and then she would run for miles alongside us on the small lanes when we lived in Shropshire. See my previous blog post Bikes

When she was younger we spent a year or so doing agility with the wonderful agility trainer Lee Gibson. 

He was very patient with us and Maisie did do a few clear rounds in some competitions that we entered.

She has never been a chewer or a barker, she lets you know when she wants to go outside and when she wants to go to bed she whines a bit at about 11pm and that means you have to go with her to her cage in the utility room. You have to flatten out her bedding before she’ll get in! 

She has never been keen on other dogs or small children (mind you I’m not too fussed about children either!) but I think that comes from not being used to having them around so she feels it very unusual when her place is invaded by other hounds or the little ones.  When the grandchildren visit she tends to take herself off to the safety of her cage and stays there, venturing out occasionally to check if they are still here.

She knows all her toys and will go and fetch the ‘duck’, the ‘snake’ or her bone when asked to. We have tried to keep away from squeaky toys but thats more because i cant stand the noise of squeaky toys. So any squeaky Christmas presents have usually ended up the cupboard by the first week of January.

She is  a wonderful car traveller too,  accompanying us on our many trips away to places far and wide and of course the many many ferry trips between UK and Ireland as we did up and then finally moved to our new house. There have been times when I have stopped the car and gone and checked to make sure she was in her cage because once she is in her little den we never hear another noise from her.

We said that we wouldn't allow her onto the furniture unless we invited her from time to time when she has cuddles with Tony - they are as thick as thieves sometimes - She is the other woman in his life - they have great conversations cuddled up together on the sofa or lying on the floor.

Healthwise we have been extremely lucky with Maisie- I know other pet owners who max out their pet insurance every year. It wasn’t until about 4 years ago when Maisie hurt her leg jumping over a wall which we didn't realise was so high on the opposite side that she injured her front right leg. Since then she’s had a slight limp and longer walks became shorter and shorter. Rides out on the bike just became rides out with her in the basket. Last year we spent a wonderful sunny day out at Enniscrone, north of our home here in Ireland and we ended up giving her piggy backs on the walk back along the beach to the car.

Going into lockdown we were very happy as it meant we had lots of time to spend in the garden especially with the good weather. We had started to notice that Maisie was sleeping a bit more but we put that down to her being out in the garden, playing ball etc. Also her back legs seemed to give way on her from time to time when she was walking around. She was drinking a lot more water and seemed to have lost weight. 

Towards the end of May, after a couple of weeks of keeping a closer eye on her we decided to make a visit to the vet. He took some blood and we found out that she has diabetes. 

Working with peoples feet I’ve got to know a bit about diabetes plus our son in law has Type 1 diabetes but I never realised that dogs could get it. 

Every day we have to give her an insulin injection after her morning and evening meals. It’s quite simple to do,  just at the back of her neck. She seems to know what’s coming now. The change in her was highly noticeable once we had started her insulin jabs. Her energy levels perked up and we noticed she isn’t drinking as much water as she had been. It took about 3 weeks of trips back and forth to the vets to get the insulin level right.

However it seems diabetes doesn’t come alone. It is only about 8 weeks since her diagnosis and although initially we were pleased that she was ‘back to normal’ chasing the ball in the garden and not wanting to sleep all day, over the past 2 weeks we have realised that she is losing her eyesight. 

Although we had noticed her right eye was a looking a bit milky around Christmas time it wasn’t a hinderance to her. But in the past fortnight we first noticed that when you threw the ball to her right side, she didn’t see it and she had a quick dip in the new shallow pond we had built in the garden. 

And now in the past week the worst has happened. Our poor girl seems to have gone completely blind. A walk down the hallway is now like watching a drunk walking from side to side, bouncing off one wall into the opposite one. As she is going a bit deaf too, when you call her she looks in completely the opposite direction. 

So now we are learning new things, how to live with and help a blind dog.

We decided not to make the house like an obstacle course so we don't leave things lying around - Tony will be happy that I am finally putting my shoes away. Everything has to stay in the same place. But she has to learn her way around the house again. She walks  round, banging into things, and sits looking into space, it is very upsetting.

However we are all learning things.

Tony has invested in 2 different essential oils Lavender and Eucalyptus. After some online reading he decided to help Maisie around the house with some scents. So small pieces of adhesive felt squares have had either Lavender or Eucalyptus oil applied to them and stuck to various places at Maisie nose height around the house. Eucalyptus oil has been designated as the negative oil so is on felt squares in danger areas, like cupboard corners and lavender oil is the positive oil on squares at doorways and so on. 

It will take a while for Maisie to hopefully associate each smell with either bumping her nose or getting through safely.

We have found ourselves bent over clapping loudly in front of her to guide her too - as her hearing was not great now anyway - it means we are being a lot louder in the house. I have also relented and bought her a squeaky toy, she loves it and has made up her own game of pushing it under the coffee table and then expecting us to retrieve it.

We are lucky that we have a large garden for Maisie to explore but that comes with hazards too such as the pond and some stone steps so we have decided to invest in an extendable lead which we attach to her harness which she always wore on walks. 

This means we can help her across from the house to the grass and she can roam freely but with us helping her not bump  into too many things. She has already got to know the different surfaces that there are so from the back door is a short smooth path, leading to gravel, which leads to a kerb on to the grass.  It’s been heartbreaking to watch her trip up the kerb or walk picking up her feet high in readiness to the kerb so hopefully by walking out with her will help her.

Another thing she does now is lie in the most strangest of places but of course she doesn’t really know that, its just to us it looks strange that she is lying in the middle of the room instead of up against the wall as she would have in the past.

We have made tentative enquiries about cataract operations for dogs - they do exist but we don't know how successful they could be. We found out a year or so ago that with age she has developed a heart murmur so that may exclude her from being able to have a general anaesthetic.  

We are truly shocked by just how quickly she has lost her sight and it must be a shock to her too - trying to understand this sudden black that has descended to her world.  I have shed many tears this past week, as she bumps her way around the place. However she is still a member of our family so she will get all the care and attention she needs. 

Bike Buffet

Last week hubby and I decided to join the local bike buffet.  I had seen an advert on the book of face about it and decided it looked like it could be fun.

I called a few days before to book our place and was told that there were only about 10 people booked so far so imagine our surprise when we turned up and there were a few more than that  45 to be precise!
So what’s a bike buffet?
Well the idea is that you cycle from pub to pub and eat a different course at each place.

We drove to the Westport town hall which was the starting point and got our bikes out ready. We were greeted first of all with Mocktails and had a chance to eye up who else would be cycling with us. There were couples and friends and families, kids on their own bikes or sitting in a seat at the back of mum or dad.

We were asked to choose what starter we wanted from a choice of three and then we set off to our first pub/restaurant. Although the first part of the cycle was through the town we found ourselves quite quickly onto the The Great Western Greenway cycle track. It was a lovely chance to take in the local views and it was part of the track that we hadn’t cycled before. Also it wasn’t a race so people chatted as we went along. 

We arrived at our first stop off place - The Coast bar. We were guided up to a lovely dining room with views over the quay and it was nice to sit down on tables of 6-8 people, eat our starters and chat to other diners/cyclists.

Once we had finished our starters we set off again. Our route took us through the grounds of Westport House so away from any traffic. 
We stopped for our main course in the grounds of Westport house at Gracys, a pizzeria. Once again we sat at tables of 6 people and were served beautiful tasty pizzas, chips and salad. We chose to sit with different people so we could meet new people. There was also some live Irish music which was great to listen to as we chatted and ate our food. 

We set off again through the grounds of the house and then onto the main street of Westport to our final destination for our desserts - Clew Bay Hotel. 

By the time we had finished our desserts it was getting dark so we set off back to our van and went home. We thoroughly enjoyed this experience, it was a great way to meet new people, try out different restaurants and explore a little bit more of our new home area. We felt it was great value for money at only €20. I would definitely go on one again. Apparently they are run every year, once a month during the summer months and generally the venues change every month.